From a School Chess Club to World No. 4: The Incredible Story of Shubhi Gupta

Imagine sitting down at a chess board in a foreign country for the very first time, not for school, not for fun, but to compete against some of the best young players in the world. The pieces are set. The clock is ticking. But you can barely see the board.

That is exactly what happened to Shubhi Gupta in March 2024, when she travelled to Uzbekistan for her first independent international chess tournament. She was just 15 years old, far from home, and dealing with a medical mishap that blurred her vision for nearly a week. Yet, one year later, that same girl returned to the same country, and this time, she came back victorious.

Today, Shubhi Gupta is India’s No. 1 ranked girl in chess and the Girls’ World No. 4 on FIDE’s official rating list for female players aged 20 and under. She is only 16.

How It All Started

Shubhi’s story does not begin with a grand plan. It begins simply, with a hobby class.

At the age of eight, Shubhi joined her school’s chess club in Ghaziabad, Uttar Pradesh. Chess was just something to do after school hours. But then came a local inter-school competition, where she finished third. That small podium finish was enough to spark something inside her.

Her father, Pradeep Gupta, who works in the IT sector, saw that spark and acted on it. He enrolled her in a weekend chess academy, and just six months later, Shubhi was competing in her first major event, the Under-9 National Championship in Ahmedabad in 2019. She finished 10th and opened her FIDE rating at 1070, which is the international chess rating system used worldwide.

For a child who had been playing seriously for less than a year, it was a very promising start.

Lockdown Becomes a Turning Point

Then, in 2020, the world came to a halt because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Schools closed, playgrounds emptied, and children across the country were stuck at home. For many kids, that meant spending hours on mobile phones or watching TV. For Shubhi, it meant chess, almost nothing but chess.

Her rating was sitting at just 1095 when her family reached out to Delhi-based coach Prasenjit Dutta. What followed was a period of intense, focused training that would lay the foundation for everything that came after.

“She was completely immersed in chess all the time,” Dutta recalled. “Whatever study material I gave her, she immediately worked on it. Her fundamentals were missing initially, so we worked incredibly hard on those.”

Dutta was patient. He knew Shubhi had something special, but tournaments were still closed because of the pandemic. All he could do was prepare her and wait.

While waiting, Shubhi made the most of online competitions. She won gold in the National School Under-11 Championship, took bronze in the 2021 National Under-14, and grabbed both individual and team gold medals at the Western Asian Under-12 Championship.

Her rapid rise online did raise a few eyebrows. Some people questioned whether a young, relatively unknown girl from Ghaziabad could really be this good. But Dutta knew the truth. It was not luck. It was hours of grinding, day after day, during a time when most people had simply given up on routine.

Silencing the Doubters

When over-the-board tournaments finally returned in 2022, Shubhi stepped out from behind the screen and proved herself on the physical board.

She won the National Amateur Championship in the under-2000 rating category. Then, she went on to win the gold medal at the National Under-12 Championship in Mandya, near Bengaluru.

That national title was significant for a reason beyond just the result. Indian chess has historically been strong in the southern states, with most top juniors coming from Tamil Nadu, Telangana, and Karnataka. When Shubhi brought the national title back to Ghaziabad and to Uttar Pradesh, it was the first time in a long time that a national junior chess title had come to North India.

“This was the first time a national title came back to North India,” Pradeep said. “It was a huge achievement that boosted everyone’s morale.”

That title also came with a reward far bigger than a trophy, qualification to the World Cadet Championship 2022 in Batumi, Georgia.

Becoming a World Champion at 12

In Batumi, Shubhi competed against players from over 70 countries. She was 12 years old, representing India on the world stage, playing against the best young chess players on the planet.

She won. Shubhi Gupta became the Under-12 Girls’ World Champion.

Back in Delhi, Dutta had stayed up through the night to watch her games live. He was watching her moves in real time, comparing them with computer engine analysis, and what he saw left him speechless.

“Her moves were coming with around 98–99% accuracy,” he said. “The top engine recommendation, that’s what she played. For a player at that age to play with virtually no mistakes showed a huge leap in strength.”

For a 12-year-old to play at near-computer accuracy in a World Championship is something very few people ever manage. Shubhi had done it.

The Family Behind the Champion

Chess at a competitive international level is not cheap. Entry fees, flights, hotels, coaching, training material, it all adds up very quickly. Pradeep manages these costs through his IT job, and the financial pressure has been real.

But money is only part of the story. The bigger story is the family’s commitment.

Shubhi’s mother, Urmila, had no knowledge of chess when her daughter first started playing. She could not tell a rook from a bishop. Over time, however, Urmila gradually became Shubhi’s full-time training partner, travel companion, and analyst. She learnt the game from scratch, specifically so she could be useful to her daughter.

Today, Shubhi and her mother spend nearly 80% of their time away from home, travelling to tournaments across India and abroad.

Shubhi’s elder brother, who is in his final year of engineering, also plays chess with the family whenever he is free. For this Ghaziabad family, the game has become a shared language, a way of spending time together even when life gets busy.

Sponsors have also stepped in to support Shubhi’s journey. With that backing, she has been able to train under top Grandmasters, including GM Swapnil Dhopade and GM Srinath Narayanan. It was GM Srinath who strongly encouraged the family to send Shubhi to international open tournaments abroad, knowing that domestic competition alone would not be enough to push her to the next level.

The Uzbekistan Nightmare

Following Srinath’s advice, the family decided to send Shubhi to Uzbekistan in March 2024. It was her first independent international tournament, meaning this was not an official event she had qualified for, but one the family had chosen and paid for on their own.

The trip did not go as planned.

Before leaving, Shubhi was using eye drops as part of her routine eye care. At the medical store, a simple but costly mistake was made: instead of the 0.1% solution that she normally used, they were given a 1% solution, a dose that was 100 times stronger.

The result was severe. Shubhi’s vision became blurred and hazy for seven to eight days. She could barely see the chess board in front of her.

“Her entire first tournament in Uzbekistan was ruined because she simply could not see the board clearly,” Pradeep said.

It would have broken many players. But Shubhi played through it.

Heartbreak in Durgapur

Later in 2024, Shubhi faced a different kind of challenge, one that had nothing to do with eye drops or travel, but everything to do with pressure.

At the National Women’s Championship in Durgapur, West Bengal, she played brilliantly. She led the field going into the final rounds, with a national title well within reach. Then, the weight of the moment caught up with her.

She lost her final two games and dropped to fourth place. She took home Rs 3.5 lakh in prize money, but the missed title hurt deeply. She went into a low period after the tournament.

What happened next, though, shows a lot about who Shubhi Gupta is.

She completely stepped away from chess. She picked up Mandala art. She watched movies. She sketched. She let herself breathe.

Her parents, who admitted they had sometimes been too hard on her after losses in the past, also handled this moment better. “We told her, ‘It’s just one game. It’s not the last tournament,'” Pradeep said.

The break worked. Just days after Durgapur, Shubhi travelled to Jamshedpur for the National Under-19 Championship, and won it. The title erased the disappointment of Durgapur completely.

Exams, Boards, and 96%

While all of this was happening on the chess board, Shubhi was also preparing for her Class 10 board exams. Late-night tournament preparation was running alongside textbook revision. Most students spend months in full preparation mode for the boards. Shubhi had one and a half months.

She scored 96%.

“She prepared mostly through YouTube, speaking with teachers, and self-study,” her father said.

It is a reminder that behind the chess titles and the FIDE rankings is a teenager who is also managing school, studies, and the normal pressures of growing up.

Munich, Germany, and a Historic Double

In May 2025, Shubhi and her mother flew to Munich, Germany. She was entered in two back-to-back international tournaments, and what followed was arguably the most important month of her chess career so far.

In the first tournament, she achieved a Woman Grandmaster (WGM) norm. In the second, she completed a full International Master (IM) norm. Together, these results pushed her up by 37 places in the world rankings and added 184 rating points to her score.

She became India’s No. 1 in the girls’ category and climbed to World No. 4.

Remarkably, even though Shubhi has now met all the requirements to officially claim the Woman International Master (WIM) title, the family has chosen not to apply for it.

“We didn’t claim the WIM title,” Pradeep said. “Her dream is not to stop here. She is aiming directly for the WGM, the IM, and ultimately, the absolute Grandmaster title.”

Shubhi Gupta’s journey is a story of small beginnings, hard work, painful setbacks, and quiet resilience. From a school hobby class in Ghaziabad to the top of the world rankings, she has done it all before turning 17, with her family beside her every step of the way.

The chess board that was once blurry and out of focus in Uzbekistan is now very much in her sights.